Why not host your own top level domain?

Register your own top level domain for only half a million quid! What a bargain!

New Generic Top Level Domains Available from 12th of January

From Thursday you will be able to register your own top level domain (TLD). I, for example, could register .webdesign, if I felt so inclined. And was rich.

I’m not opposed to the opening up of the TLD marketspace, I’m just not happy about the way that ICANN is going about doing it. Their approach is to make it so expensive that it won’t be worthwhile for most people to even consider.

At a cost of $185,000 (£120,000) just to apply, obtaining one of the new names is a serious financial commitment.

“Probably you are closer to half a million dollars to get it off the ground,” said Jonathan Robinson…

So it’s unlikely that we’ll be seeing small businesses using the new top level domain spaces, but we will probably start seeing things like .mars, .coke, .ms, .google, etc.

No doubt we will on the other hand also be treated to some more generic gTLDs too with multiple companies buying second level domains from them, such as perhaps .london, .bristol, .nottingham, .manchester. Maybe, if some enterprise registers .reading, or even .webdesign we will some day see a squelchdesign.reading or similar.

But I suspect what’s going to happen is the majority of companies are going to carry on using the favourites: .com, .co.uk, .net, .org while the corporations and conglomerates are going to start using .pepsi, .nestle, .walmart, etc leading to a two-tiered web. It’s like the old net neutrality debate all over again.

Clearly only time will tell.

Say thanks?

Found this article useful? Why not buy me a beer, like Squelch Design on Facebook or join our mailing list to say thanks?

About Matt Lowe

Matt Lowe is a WordPress web designer / developer based in Newbury, Berkshire. After 8 years of doing the nine-to-five for other companies and watching them make the same mistakes over and over he set out in business on his own, forming Squelch Design to help businesses get online and make money.